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January 2003Latest NewsPosted: Friday, January 31, 2003 ¤ Pentagon Stocks Up on Body Bags ¤ Episcopal Leader Criticizes U.S. Policy ¤ The Many Wars of George W. Bush ¤ Blinded by Belligerence ¤ Not Our Finest Hour ¤ A War Crime or an Act of War? ¤ Iraq paper says "idiot" Bush may fabricate evidence ¤ Poll Shows Opposition To War Is Growing ¤ Mandela attacks Blair and Bush ¤ How Saddam plotted to get A-bomb power ¤ Why an attack now would be so very dangerous ¤ Sharon's victory presages internal strife ¤ US launches large military operation in southern Afghanistan ¤ George Bush with clown's nose T-shirt gets airing in Brazil ¤ Chinese capitalism: industrial powerhouse or sweatshop of the world? ¤ US seeks to delay Mideast peace plan ¤ Blix Says He Saw Nothing to Prompt a War ¤ Iraq: U.S. Could Plant Weapons Evidence ¤ Israeli jets buzz Lebanon ¤ Public back campaign against war on Iraq ¤ Eight out of 10 Britons oppose unilateral war on Iraq: Poll ¤ Norwegian may not support war, even with new resolution ¤ 4 Americans Die in Afghanistan Crash ¤ Seven Dead in Australia Train Accident ¤ Blair pressed to back final deadline for war ¤ Dismay in Brussels at break in ranks ¤ Open arms ¤ Soon the military timetable will start to dictate events ¤ Bush is a shameless charlatan, says Pyongyang ¤ Why break Europe for this senseless war? ¤ A show of weakness in a divided continent ¤ War on Iraq unjustified: APC ¤ UN inspector terms North Korea greater threat than Iraq ¤ Turkey and the Iraq war ¤ Sanctioning the spilling of blood ¤ An ugly turnaround ¤ Bush to turn up heat on UN waverers ¤ No proof of Iraq, al-Qaeda links: analysts ¤ Security aides scramble to build credible Powell case ¤ Forget about evidence, look at the facts ¤ The Crusade to Baghdad Latest News Posted: Friday, January 31, 2003 ¤ Mandela attacks Blair and Bush ¤ 4 Americans Die in Afghanistan Crash ¤ Seven Dead in Australia Train Accident ¤ Blair pressed to back final deadline for war ¤ Dismay in Brussels at break in ranks ¤ Open arms ¤ Soon the military timetable will start to dictate events ¤ Bush is a shameless charlatan, says Pyongyang ¤ Why break Europe for this senseless war? ¤ A show of weakness in a divided continent ¤ War on Iraq unjustified: APC ¤ UN inspector terms North Korea greater threat than Iraq ¤ Turkey and the Iraq war ¤ Sanctioning the spilling of blood ¤ An ugly turnaround ¤ Bush to turn up heat on UN waverers ¤ No proof of Iraq, al-Qaeda links: analysts ¤ Security aides scramble to build credible Powell case ¤ Forget about evidence, look at the facts ¤ The Crusade to Baghdad Update : Jan. 31, 2003 Posted: Friday, January 31, 2003 Trini Comments on Terror Threat I believe the Trinidad Express became a pawn in a bigger plot. It is possible that U.S. agencies working with some members of the opposition party staged the 'terror lab' incident with or without the knowledge of the journalist. The Trinidad Express in their greed for higher ratings was duped into publishing that story. Making the Links: ¤ Trinidad and Tobago ships gasoline to Venezuela ¤ U.S. and UK encourage Cruise Ships to pull out of T&T ¤ TT Islamic group threatens to use chemical and biological weapons ¤ Detoxifying Trinidad's Terrorist Threat ¤ No evidence of terrorists in TT ¤ Form of Terrorism ¤ Unintelligent intelligence El paro pasa a la fase de "horario restringido" The Trinidad Express aided Terrorists Posted: Friday, January 31, 2003 "A truth that's told with bad intent, beats all the lies you can invent." -William Blake What they reported was not the truth but even if they believed it was, the Trinidad Express clearly intended to exploit this story for media ratings and sensation and not the safety of people as they want us to believe. On a Radio talk-show today, Dale Enoch, the head of the Media Association of Trinidad and Tobago (MATT), is still trying to defend the actions of the Journalist and the Trinidad Express following their Sunday's sensational story about a group of Terrorists in Trinidad and Tobago. The media association should be called MATTRESS because it appears that Dale Enoch is in charge of sleepers. To quote the Trinidad Express: "A continuing investigation by the Sunday Express into the intelligence reports by US and British agencies, last week led this newspaper to a secret location where it was shown several substances which were described as "organic and inorganic chemical compounds used to manufacture various weapons".The Trinidad Express and the 'journalist' in question should have promptly contacted the police once they believed the threats. Even if the government and the police after their investigations found that no such threat existed, the report would have been a credible bit of news if they did the right thing first. But they really cannot claim what they published was investigative journalism when they did not confirm anything. What they published was not credible but incredible. The Trinidad Express is not qualified to verify the substances they displayed so there was little to be gained by allowing their personnel to be blindly led to the 'hidden laboratory' except for those sensational photos. The photos were the proof that they were there simply to exploit the story for commercial purposes. Notwithstanding the fact that most locals are treating the threats as a hoax, the journalist involved said he believed the threats were credible. The Trinidad Express failed to promptly notify the authorities and in so doing/not doing, the journalists and the Trinidad Express became part of the terrorist plot. Today the Trinidad Guardian Newspapers is reporting a case (Mom in jail for failing to report) about a mother appearing in court charged with refusing to inform the police that her daughter was being sexually abused. Anyone with a little sense would see that if the mother was aware the child was being abused and failed to report it, then the mother contributed to the abuse of the child. If the Trinidad Express got a phone call that a bomb in a briefcase was placed in their building, they would promptly call the police and evacuate the building. They would not write the story for the police to learn of it days later through the media. Their primary concern would be their safety and that is the appropriate conduct. In this 'lab threat' report their conduct was inappropriate and dangerous. The Trinidad Express became part of the plot to terrorize the nation when they failed to promptly notify the relevant authorities upon believing the threat to be credible. (The reporter said he believed it was credible.) Taking the time to write the story then publishing it should have followed a prompt report to the authorities. They should also be held liable if people and businesses suffer losses as a result of their irresponsible conduct. The media does not have the right to collaborate with others to terrorize a nation like some are doing in Venezuela, the UK and the United States of America. During a radio interview, the journalist involved in the story spoke about his journalistic right to protect his sources. Apparently, he has little or no intention to fully assist the police in investigating the matter. The point that should be made to all people including journalists is that their primary responsibility is to secure lives before their own narrow interest. When this point is clearly made it would also make it difficult for terrorists to use the media as a weapon in their plot. Clearly, the journalist and the media in question felt that their 'journalistic principles' were more important than the lives of all the people in the country. For my part the 'journalist' could keep his sources and go to jail for his complicity in the affair while the government investigates the story. Seeing that they played for international attention, consider this: Cambodian radio station owner charged with inciting riots by false reporting By Jan McGirk in Bangkok, Independent/UK MAKE THE REAL CONNECTIONS: ¤ DIALOGUE: T&T's Terrorist Threat ¤ Trinidad and Tobago ships gasoline to Venezuela ¤ U.S. and UK encourage Cruise Ships to pull out of T&T ¤ Form of Terrorism ¤ Unintelligent intelligence The intention was to plant the story From: Angela February 02, 2003 The terrorists' intention was to plant that story in a major newspaper to embarrass the government and the country. That is why up to now we cannot hear anything from the supposed terrorists again. The Express cooperated to terrorize Trinidad and Tobago with an investigative-report-that-was-not. Update : Jan. 30, 2003 Posted: Thursday, January 30, 2003 George Bush senior to spend luxury holiday with Gustavo Cisneros Former US President George P. Bush is heading to the Dominican Republic for a luxury holiday, where he will spend quality time with anti-government Venezuelan media tycoon Gustavo Cisneros, who President Hugo Chavez Frias accuses of leading a push for a coup d'etat to have him forcibly removed from office. The Venezuelan leader has threatened to take action against many privately-owned media companies ... particularly the four privately-owned TV stations ... for broadcasting "seditious opposition propaganda" and a series of advertisements urging Venezuelans to support the work stoppage, which has had devastating effects on the country's economy. by Robert Rudnicki, vheadline.com Trinidad and Tobago's Terrorist Threat Posted: Thursday, January 30, 2003 Trinicenter Staff We may never be absolutely clear on the real motives behind the half-baked story in the Trinidad Express Newspapers in Trinidad and Tobago headlined, "Islamic group unveils secret 'chemical labs'", which was about a threat from an 'Islamic group' in Trinidad and Tobago. However we do know shoddy and sensationalistic journalism when we see it. Unfortunately, most people in Trinidad and Tobago seem unaffected by the International opposition to the US actions following 9/11. So it was surprising to most Trinidadians that there is a group in Trinidad and Tobago that was planning to reek havoc in opposition to the US' actions. Such a group never identified themselves in the print and electronic press. Supporters of our Websites in Trinidad and Tobago have been assisting in keeping the general public informed with alternative news and views on the 'War on Terror' and the events in Venezuela via the numerous call-in programs. We have openly demonstrated our opposition to all Terrorist actions including the present US actions and we believe if a serious group existed in Trinidad and Tobago they may have tried to contact us at some point in time, as we are very vocal on these issues. We also operate a Website (UScrusade.com) that is severely critical of the present United States' actions. No one has ever contacted us claiming to be part of any terrorist group and we are not aware of any such group in Trinidad and Tobago. Generally, the commercial media in Trinidad and Tobago does not facilitate informed debates on these International issues. They feed the public whatever comes from news agencies like BBC, Reuters and the Associated Press, without any analysis or evaluation of the reports. To date, most people have not been moved to protest any of the actions following the U.S. 9/11 attacks. The country is still engulfed in political tensions, which dominate the numerous talk shows. There are several groups that may wish to further tarnish the image of this country not least of which is the opposition party. Following the US, UK and UN terrorism travel advisory which came soon after a shipment of gasoline left our shores for Venezuela, the idea to exacerbate the situation for political motives may have been born. There is a group of Venezuelans in Trinidad and Tobago who opposed the shipment of gasoline to Venezuela because they saw it as support for Chavez. We believe that the US had their eyes on this country because of the presence of an Islamic group that violently attempted to overthrow the government in 1990. They may have also been concerned following the shipment of gasoline to Venezuela during Venezuela's business shutdown. Anyone could have been behind this threat. Freedom of expressions does not mean that someone is allowed to walk into a crowded building and shout fire while not believing there is one. If the Trinidad Express receives a bomb scare, even if they do not believe the threat is credible, their first response would be to contact the police and be guided by the police directives and investigation. In a similar manner that terrorist threat should have been treated like a bomb scare. It should have been reported to the police immediately and the police investigations should have been part of the story. Whether the Trinidad Express and the journalist in question took the threat seriously or not, their first responsibility should have been the safety of our citizens. They did not have the means to verify the threat and the responsible agencies should have been immediately notified. In consideration for the present international climate on Terrorism they should have also known that even if most locals dismissed the report as a hoax, the international community may not be aware of the possible political agendas behind the threat and the hostile political climate in the country. The Trinidad Express certainly demonstrated that they did not consider this a serious threat. Most people on the streets do not take the threats seriously, believing it to be another stunt from the Opposition party (UNC) that seems unable to adjust following their defeat at the last general elections 2002. Former Prime Minister now opposition leader, Basdeo Panday, remains bitter following his defeat at the polls and Trinidad have been experiencing what seems to be politically motivated staged incidents aimed at discrediting opposing political parties. The reporter, Darryl Heeralal, who did that shoddy bit of journalism for the Trinidad Express would not have been able to convince us at Trinicenter.com to carry that story with so many unanswered questions. We would have called the police immediately upon hearing of that threat. To further sensationalize the story, the Trinidad Express published a picture of the blindfolded journalist in the front page of their newspapers and Internet edition and without that picture most people would not have given the story a second glance. The reporter became the central figure in the plot. The bottles that were displayed during the Trinidad Express' Television newscast were regular drinks bottles and the powder on the tables could have been anything from dirt to baby's powder. The information the so-called terrorist gave the 'reporter' was easily available on the Internet and the 'reporter' said that the 'terrorists' refused to give him samples to verify the claims. Why did he not insist that someone who could have verified the substances go along with them? If the journalist really believed that a group of people did possess chemical and biological weapons or were playing around with ingredients to produce such weapons then why did he not wear some form of protective clothing? Why did he allow himself to be blindly led into such a 'dangerous' environment? How was he convinced that these people were adhering to proper laboratory standards to ensure there was no careless contamination? If there is a radical group bent on destruction then certainly they are not bound to established safety standards. The reporter certainly trusted the lunatics. Are we to believe that the reporter and the editors at the Trinidad Express were unconcerned about the possibility of that reporter and photographer returning to contaminate other people in and out of their media house? The real concern is that some one or group may actually be planning to do serious harm and when it gets reported it may be treated as another hoax. There may also be an attempt to make the story seem credible. We may never get to the bottom of this story like the quantity of cocaine and missiles found in a water tank in the home of one of the ex-ministers. The police are investigating the story and are searching for the possible lab. In our opinion the Trinidad Express acted irresponsibly by not promptly notifying the police and other relevant authorities upon hearing of this threat to our nation. Detoxifying Trinidad's Terrorist Threat Posted: Thursday, January 30, 2003 Trinicenter Staff Updated 12:58PM We may never be absolutely clear on the real motives behind the half-baked story in the Trinidad Express Newspapers in Trinidad and Tobago headlined, "Islamic group unveils secret 'chemical labs'", which was about a threat from an 'Islamic group' in Trinidad and Tobago. However we do know shoddy and sensationalistic journalism when we see it. Unfortunately, most people in Trinidad and Tobago seem unaffected by the International opposition to the US actions following 9/11. So it was surprising to most Trinidadians that there is a group in Trinidad and Tobago that was planning to reek havoc in opposition to the US' actions. Such a group never identified themselves in the print and electronic press. Supporters of our Websites in Trinidad and Tobago have been assisting in keeping the general public informed with alternative news and views on the 'War on Terror' and the events in Venezuela via the numerous call-in programs. We have openly demonstrated our opposition to all Terrorist actions including the present US actions and we believe if a serious group existed in Trinidad and Tobago they may have tried to contact us at some point in time, as we are very vocal on these issues. We also operate a Website (UScrusade.com) that is severely critical of the present United States' actions. No one has ever contacted us claiming to be part of any terrorist group and we are not aware of any such group in Trinidad and Tobago. Generally, the commercial media in Trinidad and Tobago does not facilitate informed debates on these International issues. They feed the public whatever comes from news agencies like BBC, Reuters and the Associated Press, without any analysis or evaluation of the reports. To date, most people have not been moved to protest any of the actions following the U.S. 9/11 attacks. The country is still engulfed in political tensions, which dominate the numerous talk shows. There are several groups that may wish to further tarnish the image of this country not least of which is the opposition party. Following the US, UK and UN terrorism travel advisory which came soon after a shipment of gasoline left our shores for Venezuela, the idea to exacerbate the situation for political motives may have been born. There is a group of Venezuelans in Trinidad and Tobago who opposed the shipment of gasoline to Venezuela because they saw it as support for Chavez. We believe that the US had their eyes on this country because of the presence of an Islamic group that violently attempted to overthrow the government in 1990. They may have also been concerned following the shipment of gasoline to Venezuela during Venezuela's business shutdown. Anyone could have been behind this threat. Freedom of expressions does not mean that someone is allowed to walk into a crowded building and shout fire while not believing there is one. If the Trinidad Express receives a bomb scare, even if they do not believe the threat is credible, their first response would be to contact the police and be guided by the police directives and investigation. In a similar manner that terrorist threat should have been treated like a bomb scare. It should have been reported to the police immediately and the police investigations should have been part of the story. Whether the Trinidad Express and the journalist in question took the threat seriously or not, their first responsibility should have been the safety of our citizens. They did not have the means to verify the threat and the responsible agencies should have been immediately notified. In consideration for the present international climate on Terrorism they should have also known that even if most locals dismissed the report as a hoax, the international community may not be aware of the possible political agendas behind the threat and the hostile political climate in the country. The Trinidad Express certainly demonstrated that they did not consider this a serious threat. Most people on the streets do not take the threats seriously, believing it to be another stunt from the Opposition party (UNC) that seems unable to adjust following their defeat at the last general elections 2002. Former Prime Minister now opposition leader, Basdeo Panday, remains bitter following his defeat at the polls and Trinidad have been experiencing what seems to be politically motivated staged incidents aimed at discrediting opposing political parties. The reporter, Darryl Heeralal, who did that shoddy bit of journalism for the Trinidad Express would not have been able to convince us at Trinicenter.com to carry that story with so many unanswered questions. We would have called the police immediately upon hearing of that threat. To further sensationalize the story, the Trinidad Express published a picture of the blindfolded journalist in the front page of their newspapers and Internet edition and without that picture most people would not have given the story a second glance. The reporter became the central figure in the plot. The bottles that were displayed during the Trinidad Express' Television newscast were regular drinks bottles and the powder on the tables could have been anything from dirt to baby's powder. The information the so-called terrorist gave the 'reporter' was easily available on the Internet and the 'reporter' said that the 'terrorists' refused to give him samples to verify the claims. Why did he not insist that someone who could have verified the substances go along with them? If the journalist really believed that a group of people did possess chemical and biological weapons or were playing around with ingredients to produce such weapons then why did he not wear some form of protective clothing? Why did he allow himself to be blindly led into such a 'dangerous' environment? How was he convinced that these people were adhering to proper laboratory standards to ensure there was no careless contamination? If there is a radical group bent on destruction then certainly they are not bound to established safety standards. The reporter certainly trusted the lunatics. Are we to believe that the reporter and the editors at the Trinidad Express were unconcerned about the possibility of that reporter and photographer returning to contaminate other people in and out of their media house? The real concern is that some one or group may actually be planning to do serious harm and when it gets reported it may be treated as another hoax. There may also be an attempt to make the story seem credible. We may never get to the bottom of this story like the quantity of cocaine and missiles found in a water tank in the home of one of the ex-ministers. The police are investigating the story and are searching for the possible lab. In our opinion the Trinidad Express acted irresponsibly by not promptly notifying the police and other relevant authorities upon hearing of this threat to our nation. Latest News Posted: Thursday, January 30, 2003 ¤ 11 of 15 Security Council members support continuation of inspections ¤ The president didn't address state of union ¤ Graham: Show me evidence ¤ Schröder Remains Opposed To War On Iraq ¤ Russia: Unaware of Iraq Links with Al Qaeda ¤ Bush, Berlusconi to Discuss Iraq ¤ Iraqi warheads test negative for chemical agents ¤ IAEA's Elbaradei Says Iraq Not in Material Breach ¤ US Will Announce Iraq War In 3 Weeks ¤ Anti-war protest ban is "stupid" ¤ Israeli Troops, Tanks Sweep Across Hebron ¤ Powell to bring photos to U.N. ¤ NO Evidence of Iraqi Weapons UNTIL After War ¤ All Bush wants is Iraqi oil, says Mandela ¤ Iraq Paper: Bush Speech 'Hollywood Farce' ¤ International Support Scarce for Iraq War ¤ Beating around the Bush ¤ Bush's weak case for war on Iraq ¤ White House cancels poetry reading ¤ Key powers not swayed by Bush ¤ Protesters Tell Bush, 'We're Not Buying It' ¤ Jordan said to OK limited US access to airspace, bases ¤ Oil is the reason for war ¤ Report: Iraqi spies in U.S. No, it is Protestors ¤ Nepal govt, Maoists declare immediate truce ¤ Security Council divided over the next step ¤ Blair steps up global propaganda war on Iraq ¤ To Arab ears, speech was just a war whoop ¤ We won't automatically join war, says Australian PM ¤ Talk of war and peace in North Korea ¤ Bush's rallying cry for war ¤ Unilateral action in Iraq 'would violate international law' ¤ Sharon team aim to lure moderate coalition partners ¤ Diplomacy in 'final phase' ¤ Eight leaders rally 'new' Europe to America's side ¤ War jitters in Europe ¤ Employers angry over reservists ¤ US mulls air strategies in Iraq ¤ Trinidadian Islamic group threatens to use chemical and biological weapons ¤ Detoxifying Trinidad's Terrorist Threat ¤ No evidence of terrorists in TT ¤ Security Council remains unswayed ¤ Turkey favours NATO security measures against Iraq Latest News Posted: Wednesday, January 29, 2003 ¤ Iraq's Suffering Children and Impoverished Existence from Sanctions ¤ Scientists say bioterror threat 'exaggerated' ¤ State of the union address: what the US papers say ¤ Pilger: Blair Is A Coward ¤ Counting the dead ¤ The Empire Strikes First ¤ Power Lust ¤ Is George W. Bush an imperialist? ¤ Missiles to Go. Civilians, Too. ¤ U.N. Finds No Proof of Nuclear Program ¤ Stormin' Norman: Don't rush into war ¤ U.S. unilateralism a threat to world peace ¤ Anti-war protesters announce Feb. 15 rally for `millions' ¤ Indonesians Seem Unconvinced by Bush Arguments on Iraq ¤ Congress Divided on Bush's Iraq Rhetoric ¤ Bush rejects calls to contain Saddam ¤ Bush Iraq Evidence Lies ¤ Blair: North Korea is next ¤ US forces using controversial ammo ¤ Vintage Bush seeks to satisfy gut instincts ¤ Blowing the U.N. a goodbye kiss ¤ Blix report to the UN masks US imperialist war aims ¤ Prevent 'catastrophe' over Iraq, pleads EU ¤ Ohio Democrat blasts Bush ¤ Locals aren't convinced war is needed ¤ Grate of the Onion Regress ¤ Bush listens to campaign contributions, not public opinion ¤ America's dangerous new style of war ¤ Reading between Bush's lips ¤ Dollar retests 3-year low vs euro on Iraq fears ¤ Bush speech deepens war doubts ¤ Mr. President ... Get Real ¤ ANTI WAR CAMPAIGN HITS 157,000 ¤ Bin Laden and the CIA: Is Bush Guilty of Mass Murder? ¤ The Ignorance of US threats and Inspections ¤ Iraq rejects al-Qaeda links ¤ Striking Venezuelan oil workers sacked ¤ Bush seeks to rally Americans in speech ¤ War is all but certain, says Bush ¤ Powell to Tell U.N. Council of Arms Evidence ¤ Plutonium for 25 bombs missing in Japan ¤ Win leaves Sharon with a political jigsaw puzzle ¤ Bush Stiffens Warning of War With Iraq ¤ Missiles to Go. Civilians, Too ¤ Unity on extending inspections, but little else ¤ Bush's 2003 State of the Union Speech ¤ Key Points in Bush's State of the Union Speech ¤ Bush Promises 'Full Force' if There Is Iraq War ¤ Voters snub peace candidate and opt for more from hardliner Sharon ¤ Hundreds of US troops locked in fiercest Afghan battle ¤ Ethnic riots kill six in Ivory Coast ¤ US will reveal new intelligence on Iraq weapons ¤ US B-1 jets drop 19 2000-pound bombs on Taliban positions ¤ US must silence war drums: MMA ¤ Four Palestinians shot dead, three die in blast ¤ 44 dead in Calcutta bus-truck collision ¤ Stronger than ever ¤ Presidential voice ¤ 18 Afghan Rebels Die in Clash With U.S. ¤ Children of war weigh odds on a new conflict ¤ Bush works hard to be word perfect ¤ The United States has gone war-mad ¤ UN fails to agree on date to tackle North Korea ¤ Bush hits phones in final war push ¤ War may be on hold despite Blix blast ¤ US hopes its proof will swing doubters Update : Jan. 29, 2003 Posted: Wednesday, January 29, 2003 President Hugo Chavez Frias on the offensive It is one of life's little ironies that the impending reopening of that symbol of American capitalism, McDonalds Hamburgers, which is still on "strike" against the Venezuelan government, will be hailed as a victory for President Chavez and the Bolivarian Revolution. But perhaps we should not be too surprised. By: Calvin Tucker Latest News Posted: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 ¤ War will unleash terrorism in Europe, French official says ¤ U.S. Forces Fighting Afghan Rebels ¤ Colombia war takes 'right' turn ¤ Turnout Low as Israelis Vote ¤ Shalom: Iraq war will be good for Israel ¤ Iraq set tougher weapons test by Blix ¤ Bush to Stop Short of Justifying War ¤ Kabuki theater, Iraq-style ¤ Seoul envoy to meet North's leader ¤ N. Korea accuses U.S. of planning attack ¤ Anger and Islam Rise in Jordan ¤ At the Afghan Border, Warnings of Attacks Tied to Iraq War ¤ Pakistan 'downs Indian spy plane' ¤ Hypocrisy about biological weapons ¤ Soldiers beware ¤ The Case for Not Invading Iraq ¤ Countries unite to say no to war ¤ Bush to accuse Iraq of training al-Qaida ¤ Minister rips 'evil' U.S. leadership ¤ Iraq poisons US economy: analysts ¤ Bush to show direct link of Iraq, al Qaeda ¤ Bush befuddled over Blix report ¤ The Sorry State Of The Union ¤ Left Turns in South America ¤ Who leaked Iraq's arms declaration? ¤ Another step towards war ¤ France scuppers EU Zimbabwe sanctions ¤ China executes Tibetan activist for bombings ¤ The war within Israel ¤ An engineered crisis ¤ Inspectors expose Iraq's violations ¤ The Blix Report ¤ The Baradei Report ¤ More inspections, not conflict, say Europeans ¤ Embattled Bush now faces trouble on many fronts ¤ No smoking gun, says Iraq report ¤ World tells leaders on warpath to hold on ¤ We don't need Europe: Powell ¤ Weekend bloodbath 'Sharon election ploy' ¤ North Korea faces new crisis as economic reform falters Opposition Losing Steam, Consults James Carville Posted: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 January 26, 2003, www.americas.org On January 22 Venezuela's Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ) suspended a nonbinding referendum scheduled for February 2 in which voters could call for left-populist President Hugo Chávez Frías to resign. The center-right opposition filed 2 million signatures November 4 on a petition for the referendum, but the TSJ ruled on November 28 that at least four of the five members of the National Electoral Council (CNE) had to support the referendum to schedule it. In the January 22 decision, the TSJ suspended the referendum until it had ruled on whether Leonardo Pizani could be counted as one of the CNE members. Pizani had quit in 2000 but rejoined in November, saying Congress had never accepted his resignation. (El Nuevo Herald (Miami) 1/23/03 from AP; Miami Herald 1/26/03 from AP) The suspension of the referendum came as the loose opposition coalition appeared to be fragmenting and losing international backing for its efforts to remove Chávez from office. On January 21, shipping sources reported that 70 percent of tanker pilots for the state oil company, Petróleos de Venezuela. (PDVSA), in Lake Maracaibo were quitting the "national civic strike" that the opposition began against Chávez on December 2. This will allow the company to move strike-bound vessels and will weaken the PDVSA employees' job action, the strike's strongest part. (Financial Times (UK) 1/22/03) According to a telephone poll by Consultores 21, published in the daily Tal Cual on January 19, 76 percent of Venezuelans think the strike will not achieve its goals, and 49 percent favor suspending it, against 46 percent who feel it should continue. (La Jornada (Mexico) 1/20/03 from AFP, Reuters, DPA, PL) [Telephone polls in Venezuela are skewed towards middle-class urban residents, who are more likely to have telephone service and to support the opposition.] On January 21 former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, the 2002 Nobel peace prize winner, announced his proposals for resolving the crisis: the opposition would suspend the strike and, in exchange, Chávez would either back a constitutional amendment requiring early elections for the presidency and the Congress in which he could run again, or support a binding referendum on August 19, halfway through his six-year term, through which voters could recall him. Both proposals fall far short of the opposition's demand for Chávez to step down immediately and be replaced by early elections in which he could not run. Chávez has consistently supported the idea of an August referendum, which is allowed for in the 1999 Constitution written by his supporters, and which Chávez thinks he can win [Update #659, 665, 672]. He is less supportive of the amendment for early elections, but analysts feel he could win there as well. Many doubt that the opposition would be able to unite behind a candidate strong enough to beat Chávez. (LJ 1/22/03 from correspondent) Ruling circles in the United States quickly backed the Carter proposals. The New York Times said in an editorial that they might be "the best hope for a peaceful, democratic outcome to Venezuela's political crisis." (NYT 1/24/03) The proposals also got the support of the rightwing government of U.S. President George W. Bush, which a month earlier was openly backing the opposition's demands. In a January 24 statement to the "Friends of Venezuela" group of five countries, U.S. Secretary of State Gen. Colin Powell called Carter's plan "the best path for Venezuelans" and "a way out of the current impasse." Parts of the opposition coalition in Venezuela quickly followed the U.S. lead. The Carter plan "is the same as Chávez's proposal," one opposition leader told the New York Times, but "it was positive because it came from Carter." (NYT 1/25/03) Some analysts feel that the opposition has actually helped Chávez push forward his populist "Bolivarian revolution." The strike has weakened the private sector and allowed Chávez to force conservative elements out of PDVSA; a coup attempt last April gave Chávez a chance to purge the military of his opponents. "They've handed themselves to Chávez on a platter," a foreign diplomat told the Washington Post in Caracas. Veteran British Latin America reporter Richard Gott says the strike "appears to be concluding with President Hugo Chávez ever more firmly in the saddle." Opposition leaders are now consulting informally with U.S. Democratic Party strategist James Carville to improve their public relations abroad. (WP 1/20/03 from correspondent, The Guardian (UK) 1/17/03) One person was killed and 28 were wounded in a January 20 confrontation between Chávez supporters and opponents in Charallave, 50 km southwest of Caracas. Carlos García Arriechi was the sixth person to die since the national strike began. Unknown persons shot into the crowd as Chávez opponents tried to enter the town, a Chávez stronghold. (LJ 1/21/03 from correspondent; ENH 1/21/03 from Reuters) Another person was killed on January 23 and at least 14 were wounded when a grenade or small bomb exploded near a massive march by Chávez supporters in Caracas. The explosion took place on Avenida México, one block from the march and near a subway entrance that was filled with government sympathizers. (LJ 1/24/03 from correspondent) More than a dozen items such as this appear in each Weekly News Update on the Americas (ISSN 1084-922X), published Sundays by the Nicaragua Solidarity Network of Greater New York. For a one-year subscription (electronic or hard copy costs $25 in the United States), a free one-month trial, back issues or source material, contact the network at 339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012, 212-674-9499, wnu@igc.org. Permission to reproduce this item is authorized if the reproduction includes this paragraph. United Opposition to Neoliberalism in Bolivia? Posted: Tuesday, January 28, 2003 Left Turns in South America: United Opposition to Neoliberalism in Bolivia? by FORREST HYLTON "Instead of imitating Álvaro Uribe, Sánchez de Lozada should learn from Lula." - Evo Morales Excepting Colombia, as "traditional" political parties and national economies disintegrate, South America has moved swiftly left in the new millennium: just over a year ago, Argentina witnessed a mass uprising of unprecedented proportions, while neo-populist regimes are now in power in Brazil, Venezuela, and Ecuador. In Bolivia, a country in which Left parties have never obtained more than 3.5% of the vote, Evo Morales, leader of the coca growers' trade union federation and the country's chief opposition party, MAS (Movement Toward Socialism), won 20% of the vote. He lost the presidential elections in June 2002 by a narrow margin, and only because he refused to enter into alliances with any of the neoliberal parties. When Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, who ruled Bolivia from 1993-97, was sworn in as president for a second time this past August, it was clear that neoliberalism was hobbling on its last legs. Sánchez de Lozada faced a different political scenario than the one he helped create as Senator in 1985 with Decree 21060 and the New Economic Policy, which brought full-blown neoliberalism to Bolivia. The communist tin miners' movement-the core of Latin America's most combative proletariat in the second half of the twentieth century-was broken by President Victor Paz Estenssoro, the very man who had risen to power on the strength of the miner-led national revolution in 1952. The highland Aymara movement, which had resurfaced with force in La Paz and the surrounding countryside during and after the dictatorship of General Hugo Bánzer Suárez (1971-78), degenerated into traditional clientelism and factionalism under the center-left UDP coalition (1982-85). And the coca growers' movement of the eastern lowlands had barely begun to form. The Tupac Katari Guerrilla Army (EGTK), made up almost exclusively of highland Aymara, made its appearance after 1986, but posed no threat to the neoliberal onslaught, and was destroyed by the first Sánchez de Lozada regime in 1993. Under the advice of Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs, whose "shock treatments" would soon be applied to Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, after 1985 the nationalized tin mines-the basis of the Bolivian economy after 1952-were privatized. In conjunction with his British and American business associates Sánchez de Lozada became Bolivia's leading mining entrepreneur, with an estimated personal fortune of $200 million. 20,000 miners were "relocated" from the highlands, many of them to the Chapare, and as they descended into the eastern lowlands to grow coca, they took with them the traditions of radical trade unionism they had forged in the mines and in mining communities in the previous half century. In 1988-90, the coca growers' movement, 200,000-strong, established itself as the vanguard of resistance to imperialism in Bolivia, as the U.S. ratcheted up the intensity of the drug war in Andes. In 1989, Bolivia produced enough coca paste to make 286 tons of cocaine, and in 1988, law 1008 made traffickers guilty until proven innocent. Current U.S. ambassador to Bolivia David Greenlee, then an employee of the CIA, overhauled the strategy of coca eradication by integrating military and police efforts. The coca growers, organized in trade union federations, staged massive marches "for life and dignity," in which they exalted the coca leaf, as distinct from cocaine, as part of their millennial cultural tradition. They refused any connection with drug trafficking and with rudimentary self-defense militias, they fought the growing militarization of their region under U.S. auspices. Their collective political strength grew in the early 1990s, and when Sánchez de Lozada took over in 1993, they had become a movement to reckon with. Hence their militants were subject to more frequent torture, detention, and murder than those of any other social movement in recent Bolivian history. Yet Sánchez de Lozada issued a series of reforms-privatization of pensions, the airline, the telephone company and the oil company; flexibilization of labor; municipal and land reform-that devastated that devastated rural cultivators and urban workers alike. The coca growers, in the absence of organized opposition in the valleys and highlands, remained isolated in the eastern lowlands. Bolivia became a neoliberal model, a laboratory-an IMF "success story." But like those of that other model country, Argentina, Bolivia's triumphs turned out to be costly mirages, and social conflict exploded under former dictator Hugo Bánzer (1998-2001), whose ties to the drug trade were extensive and whose governing program consisted almost exclusively of "zero coca." Bánzer's successor, Manuel "Tuto" Quiroga (2001-2), claimed to have reduced potential cocaine production to 13 tons annually. Both Bánzer and Quiroga killed more people as democratically elected presidents than Bánzer had as dictator. In April 2000 in the city of Cochabamba (pop. 500,000), a coalition of factory workers, high school and university students, professionals, salaried employees, peasants from the surrounding valley, peasant "irrigators" from the highlands, schoolteachers, neighborhood committees, university professors, non-salaried workers, the unemployed, and street kids blocked the privatization of water through massive civil disobedience. For the first time since the early 1980s, a popular movement from below had scored a substantive victory in Bolivia, defeating a North American multinational and its Bolivian servants in government. Protest spread in April and May 2000 to the highland Aymara, who shut down the region around La Paz through road blockades, as Felipe Quispe, a former guerrilla leader of the EGTK, breathed new life into the Aymara peasant trade union federation. Though the coca growers-who know the value of solidarity-supported the insurrection in Cochabamba and the blockades around La Paz, they suffered serious setbacks under Bánzer's forced eradication, and were rapidly losing ground to empire. Coca cultivation in Colombia, meanwhile, tripled to 162,000 hectares in 2000, whereas it had never covered more than 46,000 hectares in Bolivia. (We should regard these statistics with caution.) And an estimated $500 million dollars were lost annually because of forced eradication. The cycle initiated in April 2000 intensified over the next two years and culminated with the resurgence of the coca growers and the near-victory of Evo Morales in June 2002; this after former U.S. ambassador Manuel Rocha warned Bolivians not to vote for Morales. Though the material basis of the coca growers' movement (coca) has been eliminated to a remarkable extent, MAS-which managed, in its discourse of radical nationalism, to capture the disaffected urban middle class and proletarian vote-regained lost territory. So did Felipe Quispe and the highland Aymara, as the Indian Revolution* Party (MIP) obtained five seats in Congress following a year of government incompliance with the Island of the Sun Accords. Despite the superior quality of its leadership and the radically democratic nature of its organizational structure, however, the Coordination for Life and Water in Cochabamba had all but disintegrated. And while many of Felipe Quispe's supporters voted for Evo Morales, in practical terms the lowland coca growers and the highland Aymara were separated by an abyss that was widened by constant caudillo feuding between Quispe and Morales. No unity appeared on the horizon. As one might have expected, given the neo-colonial arrangements that have governed Bolivia since it separated from Spain, MAS and MIP have achieved nothing in parliament, other than the diversion of scarce resources away from the organization of the movements. Six months after the beginning of the Sánchez de Lozada regime, the balance is disastrous: several coca growers killed in confrontations with the army; four landless peasants killed by landlord militias; six more killed in the Chaco; five conversations about forced eradication of coca with no results; ongoing incompliance with the Island of the Sun Accords. Exclusive blame for this depressing panorama cannot be laid at the feet of Sánchez de Lozada, however, since he had been willing to discuss the possibility of a temporary halt to forced eradication and commit to a study of the market for legal consumption of the coca leaf-until Bush's man for Latin America, Cuban-American Otto Reich, arrived in early October. Ever since, the dialogues between Evo Morales and Sánchez de Lozada have been farcical, as there is nothing left for them to talk about. Under great pressure from the coca growers' assemblies, in late December Morales announced road blockades for January-unless the government was willing to reverse its policies on eradication and include the coca growers' unions in the planning and execution of the study of the market for coca leaf consumption. Morales had not consulted Felipe Quispe, however, and broke a verbal agreement the two had made to blockade in April, after the harvest season had passed in the highlands. Oscar Oliveira, leader of the Coordination for Life and Water, was not consulted either, even though Cochabamba is the gateway to the Chapare. Undaunted, Morales wasted no time in assembling a list of organizations that would join the January mobilization: debtors, domestics and household servants, teachers, workers without retirement funds, peasant colonizers from the Yungas, mining cooperatives, departmental workers' federations; a range of groups whose demands were being ignored by the Sánchez de Lozada administration. Morales began to focus his discourse on issues that transcended sectoral concerns, such as privatization, the export of Bolivian natural gas to the U.S. via Chile and the FTAA, and he claimed to speak, with more credibility than usual, in the national interest. It seemed as if Morales and MAS would, first, fulfill their promise of consolidating a broad-based Left opposition that brought the spatially and sectorally separate social movements together and, second, get back to extra-parliamentary roots. Morales and the opposition sent Sánchez de Lozada a letter on Christmas Eve outlining fifteen demands for discussion and announcing a blockade for January 6, 2003. They did not receive a reply. Instead, the government and media invested their resources in producing and circulating anti-blockade propaganda throughout the New Year season, proclaiming that the blockades were anti-patriotic, punished the poorest, and threatened "democracy." Once the blockades began on Monday, January 13, it quickly became evident that of all the groups assembled on Morales' list, only the coca growers had the collective power to blockade; and that the government, backed by the nation's principal newspapers and television stations as well as the U.S. Embassy, would use excessive force to stop them. By Monday morning, with the road from Sacaba (Cochabamba) to Yapacaní (Santa Cruz) shut down, 7,000 troops had descended on the Chapare lowlands, while in the highlands, 3,000 were dispatched to Oruro and La Paz, 1,000 to Sucre and Potosí. 22,000 police were mobilized nationwide and "dalmation" riot police from La Paz were sent to Cochabamba, where they did battle with university students in solidarity with the coca growers. By the end of the day, 160 people, some of them parents registering their children for school, had been detained and sent to air force bases, and a young coca grower received a bullet to the jaw that, miraculously, did not kill him. Rómulo Gonzales, a 22 year-old coca grower from the Chapare, was not so lucky: on the second day of the blockade he was shot to death from a distance of 500m near Colomi, one of the last towns before the road to Santa Cruz drops thousands of meters into the Chapare. Sánchez de Lozada, pretending that everything was under control, left for the swearing-in ceremony of Lucio Gutierrez in Ecuador, as the media broadcast misleading images of cleared roads that prompted people to travel where they had no business doing so. Felipe Quispe and the highland Aymara peasantry negotiated the provision of 500 tractors stipulated in the Island of the Sun Accords, while senior citizens broke off conversations with the government over law 2434 and the indexation of their retirement benefits to the dollar, declaring that they would march on La Paz in protest. Under control of media mogul and Vice-President Carlos Mesa, on Wednesday, January 15, Bolivia lived through one of its darkest days in recent memory: 40 km from Cochabamba, Felix Ibarra was murdered by government snipers; Willy Hinojosa, 23, died from bullet wounds in the Villa Tunari hospital in the Chapare; Victor Hinojosa died from bullet wounds in Llavín; and coca growers militias' ambushed and injured eight soldiers in Cristal Mayu. Most tragically, six senior citizens, forced by the "dalmation" police to get on buses the government had rented in order to disperse the march on La Paz in the wee hours of the morning, died in an accident on the road to Oruro, along with seven other passengers. The bus the government rented did not have mandatory insurance and it is not clear who will pay the survivors. Blockades extended partially from the Chapare to Santa Cruz, Potosí and Oruro, while in El Alto, an Aymara city of 500,000 on the upper rim of La Paz, students, market vendors, and parents of conscripted soldiers marched with local senior citizens. U.S. Ambassador David Greenlee arrived in La Paz just as the situation appeared to have slipped out of government control, but he declined to comment until Sánchez de Lozada returned for the ceremony of protocol. On Thursay and Friday, President Sánchez de Lozada regained the initiative, inviting Evo Morales to dialogue in Cochabamaba, and the senior citizens' leader met with the vice president in La Paz. However, when Morales arrived in Cochabamba, he was told that the president would not meet with him until the blockade was lifted and was given three hours to take action. In return, the government promised to lift what it called "control measures", i.e. repression. The Defender of the People, Ana María Romero, a government official, noted that such short-term time limits could frustrate the chances for dialogue, since it takes the popular movements much longer to arrive at decisions through assembly and consensus. The government betrayed its utter ignorance of the participatory mechanisms through which popular democracy works in Bolivia. Or perhaps the 3-hour time limit was designed to make dialogue impossible. In any event, through the magic of the media, Morales came off as intransigent and the government as reasonable. Shrewdly, the government and media played the senior citizens off against the coca-growers. Whereas the former operated exclusively within the parameters of the constitution, we were told, the latter were violent, human rights violators seeking to destabilize the country at the expense of the impoverished peasantry and urban proletariat. On Friday, the senior citizens' march arrived in La Paz with great media fanfare and received an astonishing display of material solidarity and moral support from all sectors of the urban population. Vice President Carlos Mesa sought to redeem himself with the help of the cameras and the music. By Friday's end, though, there were 700 people detained on various air force bases throughout the country, government forces had killed five people and were responsible for the deaths of six more. Ana María Romero, Defender of the People, reported that the prisoners were abused with racial epithets, and that detained women were being raped and threatened with rape. Blockades continued in the Chapare, Santa Cruz, and the semi-tropical Yungas north of La Paz, but the highlands were firmly under government control. Even though pressure from within the Aymara trade union federation was mounting to join the mobilization, Felipe Quispe announced blockades for February. On Saturday, 1500 miners marched from Huanuni, surrounded by tanks and under surveillance from the air, toward Oruro, but in Machamarquita 500 of them clashed with government forces, and miner Adrían Martínez was shot and killed. In what looks to be the most significant development since the rise of MAS, Evo Morales convened the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the People in Cochabamba on Sunday, January 19. Only Felipe Quispe and Saturnino Mallku, the bankrupt leader of the moribund Bolivian Workers' Central (COB), were left out. What makes the group so important is that it could succeed in cementing the unity that the miners lent to the COB in the golden years of struggle before the 1980s. In those days, the COB formed a solid wall of opposition to dictatorial military governments and occasionally exercised dual power. If the new COB that Morales is calling for comes together, the popular movements might be exercising dual power again in the not-too-distant future. The government will almost surely declare a State of Siege, which makes opposition politics illegal, the moment signs of such a development appear. Cochabamba is already under a de facto state of siege, and the industrialists and agro-exporters have called for the government to implement one nationwide. Foreign NGOS have come in for criticism for their alleged support for the mobilization, and their members could be detained and/or deported as things go from bad to worse. A key variable will be the morale of the army. Already parents of conscripts have complained that their sons, who should have returned home at the end of 2002, "are being used to kill their coca-growing brothers." Food for the conscripts is scarce and poor quality, and some of the parents do not know the whereabouts of their sons. After a two-day pause in which the Chapare was cleared for traffic, the government still refused to discuss popular demands under the pressure of direct action, and it looked like the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the People was going to be another case of unrealized possibility. But on Wednesday, January 23, Felipe Quispe became part of the leadership. Thus through their trade union confederation, the highland Aymara peasants have joined the departmental trade union federations (CODs); a federation of Aymara and Quechua communities (CONAMAQ); factory workers, the Coordination for Life and Water, peasant irrigators, and university students in Cochabamba; peasant colonizers in the Yungas; peasant federations from Sucre, Potosí, Cochabamba, Oruro, and part of La Paz; the Bartolina Sisa women's peasant federation; as well as the unemployed and miners' cooperatives. In all likelihood, the flow of people and goods will be paralyzed in Bolivia in the coming days, and it is doubtful that the government will make concessions without first raising the level of repression dramatically through State of Siege legislation. If the opposition can maintain its fragile unity, there is reason to hope that it will obtain the renunciation of Sánchez de Lozada and Carlos Mesa-which would be a popular victory of historic proportions. Rather than a carbon copy replacement president, a Constituent Assembly, first put on the table during the water wars of April 2000, might begin to outline a new social order in Bolivia. Though it is impossible to say how such complex processes will work themselves out, further radicalization of the anti-neoliberal opposition seems inevitable for the time being. Let us hope that Lula realizes that the Bolivian conflict can be another staging ground for Brazilian diplomacy as, under the umbrella of the World Social Forum, left turns continue to reverberate throughout South America. *The P in MIP is for Pachakutic, from pacha, or space-time, and kutic means turning around-revolution, in the sense of a world turned right side up. Forrest Hylton is conducting doctoral research in history in Bolivia Left Turns In South America Posted: Monday, January 27, 2003 by Forrest Hylton "Instead of imitating Álvaro Uribe, Sánchez de Lozada should learn from Lula." - Evo Morales Excepting Colombia, as "traditional" political parties and national economies disintegrate, South America has moved swiftly left in the new millennium: just over a year ago, Argentina witnessed a mass uprising of unprecedented proportions, while neo-populist regimes are now in power in Brazil, Venezuela, and Ecuador. In Bolivia, a country in which Left parties have never obtained more than 3.5% of the vote, Evo Morales, leader of the coca growers' trade union federation and the country's chief opposition party, MAS (Movement Toward Socialism), won 20% of the vote. He lost the presidential elections in June 2002 by a narrow margin, and only because he refused to enter into alliances with any of the neoliberal parties. When Gonzalo Sánchez de Lozada, who ruled Bolivia from 1993-97, was sworn in as president for a second time this past August, it was clear that neoliberalism was hobbling on its last legs. Sánchez de Lozada faced a different political scenario than the one he helped create as Senator in 1985 with Decree 21060 and the New Economic Policy, which brought full-blown neoliberalism to Bolivia. The communist tin miners' movement-the core of Latin America's most combative proletariat in the second half of the twentieth century-was broken by President Victor Paz Estenssoro, the very man who had risen to power on the strength of the miner-led national revolution in 1952. The highland Aymara movement, which had resurfaced with force in La Paz and the surrounding countryside during and after the dictatorship of General Hugo Bánzer Suárez (1971-78), degenerated into traditional clientelism and factionalism under the center-left UDP coalition (1982-85). And the coca growers' movement of the eastern lowlands had barely begun to form. The Tupac Katari Guerrilla Army (EGTK), made up almost exclusively of highland Aymara, made its appearance after 1986, but posed no threat to the neoliberal onslaught, and was destroyed by the first Sánchez de Lozada regime in 1993. Under the advice of Harvard economist Jeffrey Sachs, whose "shock treatments" would soon be applied to Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union, after 1985 the nationalized tin mines-the basis of the Bolivian economy after 1952-were privatized. In conjunction with his British and American business associates Sánchez de Lozada became Bolivia's leading mining entrepreneur, with an estimated personal fortune of $200 million. 20,000 miners were "relocated" from the highlands, many of them to the Chapare, and as they descended into the eastern lowlands to grow coca, they took with them the traditions of radical trade unionism they had forged in the mines and in mining communities in the previous half century. In 1988-90, the coca growers' movement, 200,000-strong, established itself as the vanguard of resistance to imperialism in Bolivia, as the U.S. ratcheted up the intensity of the drug war in Andes. In 1989, Bolivia produced enough coca paste to make 286 tons of cocaine, and in 1988, law 1008 made traffickers guilty until proven innocent. Current U.S. ambassador to Bolivia David Greenlee, then an employee of the CIA, overhauled the strategy of coca eradication by integrating military and police efforts. The coca growers, organized in trade union federations, staged massive marches "for life and dignity," in which they exalted the coca leaf, as distinct from cocaine, as part of their millennial cultural tradition. They refused any connection with drug trafficking and with rudimentary self-defense militias, they fought the growing militarization of their region under U.S. auspices. Their collective political strength grew in the early 1990s, and when Sánchez de Lozada took over in 1993, they had become a movement to reckon with. Hence their militants were subject to more frequent torture, detention, and murder than those of any other social movement in recent Bolivian history. Yet Sánchez de Lozada issued a series of reforms-privatization of pensions, the airline, the telephone company and the oil company; flexibilization of labor; municipal and land reform-that devastated that devastated rural cultivators and urban workers alike. The coca growers, in the absence of organized opposition in the valleys and highlands, remained isolated in the eastern lowlands. Bolivia became a neoliberal model, a laboratory-an IMF "success story." But like those of that other model country, Argentina, Bolivia's triumphs turned out to be costly mirages, and social conflict exploded under former dictator Hugo Bánzer (1998-2001), whose ties to the drug trade were extensive and whose governing program consisted almost exclusively of "zero coca." Bánzer's successor, Manuel "Tuto" Quiroga (2001-2), claimed to have reduced potential cocaine production to 13 tons annually. Both Bánzer and Quiroga killed more people as democratically elected presidents than Bánzer had as dictator. In April 2000 in the city of Cochabamba (pop. 500,000), a coalition of factory workers, high school and university students, professionals, salaried employees, peasants from the surrounding valley, peasant "irrigators" from the highlands, schoolteachers, neighborhood committees, university professors, non-salaried workers, the unemployed, and street kids blocked the privatization of water through massive civil disobedience. For the first time since the early 1980s, a popular movement from below had scored a substantive victory in Bolivia, defeating a North American multinational and its Bolivian servants in government. Protest spread in April and May 2000 to the highland Aymara, who shut down the region around La Paz through road blockades, as Felipe Quispe, a former guerrilla leader of the EGTK, breathed new life into the Aymara peasant trade union federation. Though the coca growers-who know the value of solidarity-supported the insurrection in Cochabamba and the blockades around La Paz, they suffered serious setbacks under Bánzer's forced eradication, and were rapidly losing ground to empire. Coca cultivation in Colombia, meanwhile, tripled to 162,000 hectares in 2000, whereas it had never covered more than 46,000 hectares in Bolivia. (We should regard these statistics with caution.) And an estimated $500 million dollars were lost annually because of forced eradication. The cycle initiated in April 2000 intensified over the next two years and culminated with the resurgence of the coca growers and the near-victory of Evo Morales in June 2002; this after former U.S. ambassador Manuel Rocha warned Bolivians not to vote for Morales. Though the material basis of the coca growers' movement (coca) has been eliminated to a remarkable extent, MAS-which managed, in its discourse of radical nationalism, to capture the disaffected urban middle class and proletarian vote-regained lost territory. So did Felipe Quispe and the highland Aymara, as the Indian Revolution* Party (MIP) obtained five seats in Congress following a year of government incompliance with the Island of the Sun Accords. Despite the superior quality of its leadership and the radically democratic nature of its organizational structure, however, the Coordination for Life and Water in Cochabamba had all but disintegrated. And while many of Felipe Quispe's supporters voted for Evo Morales, in practical terms the lowland coca growers and the highland Aymara were separated by an abyss that was widened by constant caudillo feuding between Quispe and Morales. No unity appeared on the horizon. As one might have expected, given the neo-colonial arrangements that have governed Bolivia since it separated from Spain, MAS and MIP have achieved nothing in parliament, other than the diversion of scarce resources away from the organization of the movements. Six months after the beginning of the Sánchez de Lozada regime, the balance is disastrous: several coca growers killed in confrontations with the army; four landless peasants killed by landlord militias; six more killed in the Chaco; five conversations about forced eradication of coca with no results; ongoing incompliance with the Island of the Sun Accords. Exclusive blame for this depressing panorama cannot be laid at the feet of Sánchez de Lozada, however, since he had been willing to discuss the possibility of a temporary halt to forced eradication and commit to a study of the market for legal consumption of the coca leaf-until Bush's man for Latin America, Cuban-American Otto Reich, arrived in early October. Ever since, the dialogues between Evo Morales and Sánchez de Lozada have been farcical, as there is nothing left for them to talk about. Under great pressure from the coca growers' assemblies, in late December Morales announced road blockades for January-unless the government was willing to reverse its policies on eradication and include the coca growers' unions in the planning and execution of the study of the market for coca leaf consumption. Morales had not consulted Felipe Quispe, however, and broke a verbal agreement the two had made to blockade in April, after the harvest season had passed in the highlands. Oscar Oliveira, leader of the Coordination for Life and Water, was not consulted either, even though Cochabamba is the gateway to the Chapare. Undaunted, Morales wasted no time in assembling a list of organizations that would join the January mobilization: debtors, domestics and household servants, teachers, workers without retirement funds, peasant colonizers from the Yungas, mining cooperatives, departmental workers' federations; a range of groups whose demands were being ignored by the Sánchez de Lozada administration. Morales began to focus his discourse on issues that transcended sectoral concerns, such as privatization, the export of Bolivian natural gas to the U.S. via Chile and the FTAA, and he claimed to speak, with more credibility than usual, in the national interest. It seemed as if Morales and MAS would, first, fulfill their promise of consolidating a broad-based Left opposition that brought the spatially and sectorally separate social movements together and, second, get back to extra-parliamentary roots. Morales and the opposition sent Sánchez de Lozada a letter on Christmas Eve outlining fifteen demands for discussion and announcing a blockade for January 6, 2003. They did not receive a reply. Instead, the government and media invested their resources in producing and circulating anti-blockade propaganda throughout the New Year season, proclaiming that the blockades were anti-patriotic, punished the poorest, and threatened "democracy." Once the blockades began on Monday, January 13, it quickly became evident that of all the groups assembled on Morales' list, only the coca growers had the collective power to blockade; and that the government, backed by the nation's principal newspapers and television stations as well as the U.S. Embassy, would use excessive force to stop them. By Monday morning, with the road from Sacaba (Cochabamba) to Yapacaní (Santa Cruz) shut down, 7,000 troops had descended on the Chapare lowlands, while in the highlands, 3,000 were dispatched to Oruro and La Paz, 1,000 to Sucre and Potosí. 22,000 police were mobilized nationwide and "dalmation" riot police from La Paz were sent to Cochabamba, where they did battle with university students in solidarity with the coca growers. By the end of the day, 160 people, some of them parents registering their children for school, had been detained and sent to air force bases, and a young coca grower received a bullet to the jaw that, miraculously, did not kill him. Rómulo Gonzales, a 22 year-old coca grower from the Chapare, was not so lucky: on the second day of the blockade he was shot to death from a distance of 500m near Colomi, one of the last towns before the road to Santa Cruz drops thousands of meters into the Chapare. Sánchez de Lozada, pretending that everything was under control, left for the swearing-in ceremony of Lucio Gutierrez in Ecuador, as the media broadcast misleading images of cleared roads that prompted people to travel where they had no business doing so. Felipe Quispe and the highland Aymara peasantry negotiated the provision of 500 tractors stipulated in the Island of the Sun Accords, while senior citizens broke off conversations with the government over law 2434 and the indexation of their retirement benefits to the dollar, declaring that they would march on La Paz in protest. Under control of media mogul and Vice-President Carlos Mesa, on Wednesday, January 15, Bolivia lived through one of its darkest days in recent memory: 40 km from Cochabamba, Felix Ibarra was murdered by government snipers; Willy Hinojosa, 23, died from bullet wounds in the Villa Tunari hospital in the Chapare; Victor Hinojosa died from bullet wounds in Llavín; and coca growers militias' ambushed and injured eight soldiers in Cristal Mayu. Most tragically, six senior citizens, forced by the "dalmation" police to get on buses the government had rented in order to disperse the march on La Paz in the wee hours of the morning, died in an accident on the road to Oruro, along with seven other passengers. The bus the government rented did not have mandatory insurance and it is not clear who will pay the survivors. Blockades extended partially from the Chapare to Santa Cruz, Potosí and Oruro, while in El Alto, an Aymara city of 500,000 on the upper rim of La Paz, students, market vendors, and parents of conscripted soldiers marched with local senior citizens. U.S. Ambassador David Greenlee arrived in La Paz just as the situation appeared to have slipped out of government control, but he declined to comment until Sánchez de Lozada returned for the ceremony of protocol. On Thursay and Friday, President Sánchez de Lozada regained the initiative, inviting Evo Morales to dialogue in Cochabamaba, and the senior citizens' leader met with the vice president in La Paz. However, when Morales arrived in Cochabamba, he was told that the president would not meet with him until the blockade was lifted and was given three hours to take action. In return, the government promised to lift what it called "control measures", i.e. repression. The Defender of the People, Ana María Romero, a government official, noted that such short-term time limits could frustrate the chances for dialogue, since it takes the popular movements much longer to arrive at decisions through assembly and consensus. The government betrayed its utter ignorance of the participatory mechanisms through which popular democracy works in Bolivia. Or perhaps the 3-hour time limit was designed to make dialogue impossible. In any event, through the magic of the media, Morales came off as intransigent and the government as reasonable. Shrewdly, the government and media played the senior citizens off against the coca-growers. Whereas the former operated exclusively within the parameters of the constitution, we were told, the latter were violent, human rights violators seeking to destabilize the country at the expense of the impoverished peasantry and urban proletariat. On Friday, the senior citizens' march arrived in La Paz with great media fanfare and received an astonishing display of material solidarity and moral support from all sectors of the urban population. Vice President Carlos Mesa sought to redeem himself with the help of the cameras and the music. By Friday's end, though, there were 700 people detained on various air force bases throughout the country, government forces had killed five people and were responsible for the deaths of six more. Ana María Romero, Defender of the People, reported that the prisoners were abused with racial epithets, and that detained women were being raped and threatened with rape. Blockades continued in the Chapare, Santa Cruz, and the semi-tropical Yungas north of La Paz, but the highlands were firmly under government control. Even though pressure from within the Aymara trade union federation was mounting to join the mobilization, Felipe Quispe announced blockades for February. On Saturday, 1500 miners marched from Huanuni, surrounded by tanks and under surveillance from the air, toward Oruro, but in Machamarquita 500 of them clashed with government forces, and miner Adrían Martínez was shot and killed. In what looks to be the most significant development since the rise of MAS, Evo Morales convened the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the People in Cochabamba on Sunday, January 19. Only Felipe Quispe and Saturnino Mallku, the bankrupt leader of the moribund Bolivian Workers' Central (COB), were left out. What makes the group so important is that it could succeed in cementing the unity that the miners lent to the COB in the golden years of struggle before the 1980s. In those days, the COB formed a solid wall of opposition to dictatorial military governments and occasionally exercised dual power. If the new COB that Morales is calling for comes together, the popular movements might be exercising dual power again in the not-too-distant future. The government will almost surely declare a State of Siege, which makes opposition politics illegal, the moment signs of such a development appear. Cochabamba is already under a de facto state of siege, and the industrialists and agro-exporters have called for the government to implement one nationwide. Foreign NGOS have come in for criticism for their alleged support for the mobilization, and their members could be detained and/or deported as things go from bad to worse. A key variable will be the morale of the army. Already parents of conscripts have complained that their sons, who should have returned home at the end of 2002, "are being used to kill their coca-growing brothers." Food for the conscripts is scarce and poor quality, and some of the parents do not know the whereabouts of their sons. After a two-day pause in which the Chapare was cleared for traffic, the government still refused to discuss popular demands under the pressure of direct action, and it looked like the Joint Chiefs of Staff of the People was going to be another case of unrealized possibility. But on Wednesday, January 23, Felipe Quispe became part of the leadership. Thus through their trade union confederation, the highland Aymara peasants have joined the departmental trade union federations (CODs); a federation of Aymara and Quechua communities (CONAMAQ); factory workers, the Coordination for Life and Water, peasant irrigators, and university students in Cochabamba; peasant colonizers in the Yungas; peasant federations from Sucre, Potosí, Cochabamba, Oruro, and part of La Paz; the Bartolina Sisa women's peasant federation; as well as the unemployed and miners' cooperatives. In all likelihood, the flow of people and goods will be paralyzed in Bolivia in the coming days, and it is doubtful that the government will make concessions without first raising the level of repression dramatically through State of Siege legislation. If the opposition can maintain its fragile unity, there is reason to hope that it will obtain the renunciation of Sánchez de Lozada and Carlos Mesa-which would be a popular victory of historic proportions. Rather than a carbon copy replacement president, a Constituent Assembly, first put on the table during the water wars of April 2000, might begin to outline a new social order in Bolivia. Though it is impossible to say how such complex processes will work themselves out, further radicalization of the anti-neoliberal opposition seems inevitable for the time being. Let us hope that Lula realizes that the Bolivian conflict can be another staging ground for Brazilian diplomacy as, under the umbrella of the World Social Forum, left turns continue to reverberate throughout South America. *The P in MIP is for Pachakutic, from pacha, or space-time, and kutic means turning around-revolution, in the sense of a world turned right side up. Forrest Hylton is conducting doctoral research in history in Bolivia Tainted Journalism or Paranoia Posted: Monday, January 27, 2003 www.coha.org Venezuela: Tainted Journalism or Paranoia on the Part of The Middle-class Opposition Dear Colleague, As part of the ongoing debate over (concerning) the current political instability in Venezuela, we are reprinting an article, authored by Thor Halvorssen, published in the commentary section of the The Washington Times on Jan. 22, 2003, attacking the position of the Council on Hemispheric Affairs, and the response to it by COHA director, Larry Birns, which appeared in the Washington Times on Jan. 26, 2003. Venezuela through a tilted lens? Washington Times, January 22, 2003 Thor Halvorssen With every passing day, life for Venezuelans becomes more dangerous. Since his election four years ago, President Hugo Chavez has presided over the most dramatic decline in the nation's fortunes: Analysts predict that in the first quarter of 2003 the economy will contract by 40 percent; more than 1 million jobs have been lost; approximately 900,000 people have gone into voluntary exile (most of them middle-class professionals); unemployment is at a staggering 17 percent; Almost 70 percent of the country's industries have gone bankrupt; 70 percent of Venezuelans live in a state of poverty (up from 60 percent when Mr. Chavez began his rule); and the income of more than 15 percent of Venezuelans has dropped below the poverty line. Mr. Chavez's policies have left the nation in shambles. Stratospheric levels of corruption, collectivist central planning, mismanagement, and incompetence during the greatest oil boom have squandered a historic opportunity to cultivate a stable middle class. But stability is hardly the goal of Lt. Col. Chavez, who uses the nation's wealth to fund and supply weapons to the FARC and ELN drug-trafficking guerrilla terrorists in Colombia and the ETA Basque terrorist organization in Spain. Mr. Chavez has cozy relationships with the dictators of Cuba, Libya, Iran, and Iraq (Mr. Chavez praised Saddam Hussein as his "brother" and "partner"), and earlier this month Mr. Chavez was accused by his personal pilot of funneling $900,000 to Osama bin Laden. Mr. Chavez has publicly described the U.S. military response to bin Laden as "terrorism" claiming he saw no difference between the invasion of Afghanistan and the September 11 terrorist attacks on the U.S. Readers of the New York Times, The Washington Post and of the Associated Press, and viewers of CNN, are fed a dramatically different story. There is an enormous divide between what the world is hearing about Venezuela and what is really happening there. Reporters have so controlled the flow of information and disfigured the truth that their coverage of Venezuela is a caricature of what conservative critics call the "liberal media bias." What we are seeing in media coverage of Venezuela is not liberal bias, but totalitarian bias. A recent example is Christopher Toothaker of the Associated Press. Mr. Toothaker has spent considerable time in Venezuela, he speaks Spanish, and he has access to government and opposition sources. In a Jan. 4 report, he minimized the importance of the upcoming constitutional referendum, stating that the opposition presented "over 150,000 signatures" to election authorities calling for a vote on whether Mr. Chavez should resign. This is a dramatic and deliberate understatement. The Venezuelan Constitution, approved by Mr. Chavez himself, provides for a referendum if 10 percent of the electorate petitions in writing. The opposition presented 2,057,000 signatures - some 15 percent of the voting rolls - a startling error that any fact-checker should catch. The smaller figure appears in dozens of other Associated Press reports, CBS, CNN and even in a story bylined by Ginger Thompson of the New York Times that was carried in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel. Miss Thompson is no fan of objectivity. On Jan. 3, the opposition organized a march to protest Chavez. Hundreds of thousands of nonviolent demonstrators carried flags, posters and signs calling for a peaceful resolution. The protesters were ambushed by members of Mr. Chavez's armed militia who dispersed the march with a hail of bullets and rocks. The Chavez police blithely watched the armed thugs shoot at the defenseless crowd. I was there. To our incredulity, the Chavez police then supplied the criminals with tear gas grenades. In her Times story, Miss Thompson characterized the violence as a "clash" and a "street fight" - moral equivalency at its worst. American readers would never know it was an ambush. The sympathies of Miss Thompson's colleague, Juan Forero, are revealed by Larry Birns, director of the Council for Hemispheric Affairs. In late December, Mr. Birns, a refreshingly sincere D.C. activist who acts as a Chavez cheerleader and apologist, told a Venezuelan government official the names of the four reporters he believed were most amicable to the Chavez government. This Times scribe made the top of his list: "He is committed to the revolution," Mr. Birns said of Mr. Forero. Reuters and the Associated Press were also praised for their "strong support" of Mr. Chavez. The Washington Post's reporting is just as cant-laden as the New York Times', and its editorial page is utterly one-sided. Last Sunday, Mark Weisbrot of the Center for Economic and Policy Research penned a column calling the Chavez government, responsible for dozens of political deaths, "one of the least repressive in Latin America." He should travel more. Mr. Weisbrot states that "no one has been arrested for political activities." This is nonsense. Some of these arrests are so public Mr. Weisbrot cannot credibly claim ignorance. For example, Carlos Alfonso Martinez, an outspoken political opponent of Mr. Chavez and one of the most respected officers in the armed forces, was arbitrarily arrested on Dec. 30 by the secret police. The act caused public furor both because it was a further indication of government repression and also because Mr. Martinez was arrested without a warrant and remains under arrest even though a judge ordered his immediate release. How did this fact slip by the editors at The Post? Mr. Weisbrot ends his column in The Post by saying that Chavez is Venezuela's best hope for democracy and social and economic "betterment." And yet Mr. Weisbrot does not support the referendum that would let the voters declare whether Mr. Chavez rules with the consent of the governed. Mr. Chavez told voters in a television broadcast: "Don't waste time. Not even if we suppose that they hold that referendum and get 90 percent of the votes, I will not leave. Forget it. I will not go." Putting aside Mr. Chavez's track record on economics, does this really sound like the best hope for democracy? Meanwhile, members of the U.S. government, business, and diplomatic communities make their decisions based on the "knowledge" they acquire from the media. Venezuelans are suffering unnecessarily because of the arrogance and favoritism of a handful of journalists. It is wicked. Yet what is worse is that, no matter what happens, the media will never be held accountable. Thor Halvorssen is a human-rights activist who was a political adviser and consultant in two Venezuelan presidential elections. He lives in Philadelphia. Letter To The Editor, Washington Times, Published Sunday January 26, 2003 Tony Blankley Editorial Page Editor The Washington Times January 26, 2003 To the Editor: I admit I hadn't heard of your contributor, Thor Halvorssen ("Venezuela Through a Tilted Lens," 1/22/03), but I now know that he's a shameless inventor. Moreover, the Times may have been gulled by an author with a complex past, which can be checked on the internet. Also, why didn't he reveal that he wasn't just your average Philadelphian, as listed, but served as Venezuela's drug czar in the early 1990s, under one of the most corrupt governments in its history, when he was involved in questionable incidents of public interest? Halvorssen savages your professional colleagues for their alleged bias reporting from Venezuela. Among these, were two highly respected New York Times reporters, Juan Forero and Ginger Thompson, to whom I have spoken by telephone. Halvorssen's mean-spirited attack and his patently off-the-wall conspiracy theories regarding their alleged favoritism towards leftist Venezuelan president, Hugo Chávez, are an extremist's fulminations against the international media. These, almost without exception, see today's uproar there not as a Castro complot, but due to misadventures on both sides. Halvorssen's targets – the New York Times, the Washington Post, Reuters, and AP – are also vilified by the left for their anti-Chávez bias, using almost the same verbiage as his. The sin of these very solid professionals apparently is that they have tried to fairly treat an extremely involved story, thus inviting Halvorssen-like sclerotic attacks. While I'm grateful for his characterizing me as "refreshingly sincere," I'm afraid I can't return the compliment, for I think he's up to knavery. He says that I told a Venezuelan government official that Timesman Forero was "committed to the revolution." Nonsense! I said no such thing. Last Christmas Eve, I received a phone call at my in-laws house in New Jersey, from a man who spoke rapid Spanish and poor English. Since I couldn't quite understand him, I soon turned the phone over to a Spanish-speaking relative. This alleged high Chávez official frantically blurted out that an anti-Chávez coup was to occur on Dec. 29th, and that I must come down to Caracas immediately and bring four U.S. journalists of my choice with me as observers. I expressed skepticism whether this was possible, but at the very least I would need to consider it, and besides I felt that the New York Times, Reuters, AP, among others, were doing a first-class, balanced job, so why were more reporters required? I quickly sensed that the Caracas call might be a scam, particularly when the official didn't again call, as scheduled. Given his somewhat gamey biography, I now assume that Halvorssen was somehow involved in this script, or even made the call, because the only other conversant person would be the professed Chávez official, who presumably would not be the former's soulmate. Rather than a Chávez "apologist," as Halvorssen claims, COHA has been a critic since 1998, when it attacked him for his too-close military ties. Since then it has found him "arrogant," "confrontational," "authoritarian," "acerbic," and "inflexible." As for both Halvorssen and the opposition, on the rare occasions when they tell the truth, they wail that the economy is dying and that the petroleum industry is heading for ruin, but fail to acknowledge their own direct complicity. What is needed is moderation and concession. Venezuelans of Halvorssen's ilk must see that they constitute a disloyal opposition threatening the destruction of the political system through foul play, and not Athenian democrats. As for Chávez, he risks suffocating his revolution by holding it too tightly, as time runs out for him and also the opposition. Larry Birns Director Council on Hemispheric Affairs Washington, D.C. 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